ENERGY RESOURCES – KS3

Differentiated Materials
KEY WORDS
 Energy – being able to do work. e.g. food gives us
energy, so that we can move

 Fuel - Fuel is anything that is

burned or altered to obtain energy

Fuel gauge
SOLAR POWER
 Most of the Earth's energy comes from the sun
 Solar power is energy from the sun

 There are two main ways that we use the Sun's

energy
 1. Solar Cells

 2. Solar water heating

WHY USE SOLAR POWER?
Advantages
 Solar energy is free - no fuel, no waste or pollution.

 In sunny countries, easy to use in remote places

 Good for low-power uses such as solar powered garden

lights and battery chargers
Disadvantages
 Doesn't work at night.

 Very expensive to build solar power stations.

 Can be unreliable unless you're in a very sunny place

 Solar energy is renewable because the sun is

always there
ENERGY FROM FOSSIL FUELS

Fossil fuels are coal, oil and gas

Coal oil and gas

 Fossil fuels were formed from

dead plants and animals over
millions of years.

fossils
ENERGY FROM FOSSIL FUELS
 Fossil fuels have formed over millions of years. Plants
and animals died and were immediately covered by
sediment in seas or swamps.
 After millions of years of pressure and heat (90 0C to
1200C), these remains turned into COAL, OIL and
NATURAL GAS.
 Coal comes mainly from dead plants, like trees, falling
into swamps.
 Oil and gas occur together and were formed from both
plants and animals being buried.
 When we burn fossil fuels we’re using the sun’s
energy that has been stored as chemical energy
underground for millions of years.
HOW ‘FOSSIL FUEL’ POWER STATIONS WORK:

 Coal is crushed to a fine dust and burnt. Oil and

gas can be burnt directly.

www.vauxhallsociety.org.uk
WHY USE FOSSIL FUELS TO MAKE
ELECTRICITY?
Advantages
 Electricity can be generated fairly cheaply.

 Transporting oil and gas to the power stations is easy.

 Gas-fired power stations are very efficient.

 A fossil-fuelled power station can be built almost anywhere.

Disadvantages
 Pollution. Burning any fossil fuel produces carbon dioxide, which contributes
to the "greenhouse effect", warming the Earth.
 Burning coal produces more carbon dioxide than burning oil or gas.

 Mining coal can be difficult, dangerous and ugly.

 Coal-fired power stations need huge amounts of fuel.

 Fossil fuels are a non- renewable energy resource.

Once we've burned them all, there isn't any more and our use of fossil fuels has
nearly doubled every 20 years since 1900.
This is a particular problem for oil, because we also use it to make plastics and
many other products.
WIND POWER
 Wind power also comes from the sun; winds blow
because the Sun warms our atmosphere. Warm air
tends to rise, and winds are due to other air moving
in to replace it.
 The wind blows the propeller round, which

turns a generator to produce electricity

 We tend to build many of these towers together, to
make a "wind farm" and produce more electricity.
 The more towers, the more wind, and the larger the
propellers, the more electricity we can make
WHY USE WIND POWER?
Advantages
 Wind is free.

 Produces no waste or greenhouse gases.

 The land beneath can usually still be used for farming.

 Wind farms can be tourist attractions.

 A good method of supplying energy to remote areas

Disadvantages
 The wind is not always predictable - some days have no wind.

 Suitable areas for wind farms are often near the coast, where land is
expensive.
 Some people feel that covering the landscape with these towers is ugly

 Can kill birds.

 Can affect television reception if you live nearby.

 Can be noisy.

 Wind power is renewable. Winds will keep on blowing.

HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER
 Hydro-electric power is generated from falling water. Nowadays
there are many hydro-electric power stations, providing around 20%
of the world's electricity.
How it works:
 A dam is built to trap water, usually in a river valley.

 Water is allowed to flow through tunnels in the dam, to turn turbines

and thus drive generators to produce electricity.

(http://www.wvic.com/hydro-works.htm) 
WHY USE HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER?
Electricity Once the
can be dam is built,
generated the energy
constantly is almost
(all the time) free.
Advantages

No waste or
pollution
produced.
Water can be
stored above
the dam ready Hydro-electric
for when it is power stations can
needed. increase to full Much more
power very quickly, reliable than
unlike other power wind, solar or
stations. wave power.
Hydro-electric power is renewable.
The Sun provides the water by evaporation from the sea, and will continue to do it.
DISADVANTAGES
The dams are very expensive to build.

Building a large dam will flood a very

large area upstream, causing problems
for animals that used to live there.

Finding a suitable site can be

difficult – what about the people, plants
and animals living there already?

Water quality and quantity downstream

can be affected, which can have an
impact on plant life.
NUCLEAR POWER - ENERGY FROM SPLITTING
URANIUM ATOMS
 Nuclear power is generated using Uranium, which
is a metal mined in various parts of the world.
 Nuclear power produces around 11% of the world's
energy needs, and produces huge amounts of
energy from small amounts of fuel, without
pollution.

electronicsdesigninfo.blogspot.com
ADVANTAGES OF USING NUCLEAR
POWER
Nuclear power
costs about the
same as coal, so
it's not
expensive.

Does not
produce smoke
Nuclear power is or carbon
dioxide, so it
reliable.
does not cause
pollution.

Produces huge
Produces small amounts of
amounts of energy from
waste. small amounts
of fuel.
DISADVANTAGES
Although not much waste is produced, it is
very, very dangerous.
It must be sealed up and buried for many years
to allow the radioactivity to die away.

Nuclear power is reliable, but a lot of money

has to be spent on safety - if it does go
wrong, a nuclear accident can be a major
disaster.

People are increasingly concerned about

possible accidents and terrorism.

Nuclear energy from Uranium is non-renewable.

Once we've dug up all the Earth's uranium and used it, there
isn't any more. However, because only small quantities are
needed, we have enough for hundreds of years.
 TIDAL POWER - ENERGY FROM THE SEA
 How it works: Tidal Barrages
 These work rather like a hydro-electric scheme

 A huge dam (called a "barrage") is built across a river

estuary. When the tide goes in and out, the water flows
through tunnels in the dam.
 The ebb and flow of the tides can be used to turn a
turbine.

www.h2bidblog.com
ADVANTAGES OF TIDAL POWER

Once
you've built
it, tidal
power is
free.
Offshore It produces
turbines no
are not greenhouse
too gases or
expensive other waste.

Tides are
It needs
totally
no fuel.
predictable.

Not
expensive It is
to reliable.
maintain.
DISADVANTAGES OF TIDAL POWER
 A barrage across an estuary is very expensive to
build, and affects a very wide area. - the
environment and birds. There are few suitable
sites for tidal barrages.
 Only provides power for around 10 hours each
day, when the tide is actually moving in or out.

Tidal energy is renewable. The tides will continue to

ebb and flow, and the energy is there for free.
 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY IS ENERGY FROM HEAT
INSIDE THE EARTH.
How it works
 Hot rocks underground heat water to produce steam.
We drill holes down to the hot region; steam comes up, is
purified and used to drive turbines, which drive generators
to make electricity.
 Geothermal energy is an important resource in volcanically
active places such as Iceland and New Zealand.

http://keller.clarke.edu
ADVANTAGES

Geothermal
energy does
not produce
any
pollution.

Once you've
built a
The power
geothermal
stations do not
power station,
take up much
the energy is
space.
almost free.

No fuel is
needed.
DISADVANTAGES
There are not many places
where you can build a
geothermal power station. Sometimes a geothermal site may
"run out of steam", perhaps for
several years.

Dangerous gases and

minerals may come up from
underground.

Geothermal energy is renewable.

The energy keeps on coming, so long as we don't pump too
much cold water down and cool the rocks too much.
BIOMASS - ENERGY FROM ORGANIC MATERIALS
 Sugar cane can be used to make alcohol, which can be
burned to generate power
 Other solid wastes, can be burned to provide heat, or
used to make steam for a power station
 We can use rubbish, animal manure, woodchips,
seaweed, corn stalks and other waste

www.animalaid.org.uk

aq48.dnraq.state.ia.us
Advantages
 It makes sense to use waste materials where we can.

 The fuel tends to be cheap.

 Less demand on the Earth's resources.

 
Disadvantages
 Collecting the waste in sufficient quantities can be
difficult.
 We burn the fuel, so it makes pollution.

 Some waste materials are not available all year round.

Biomass is renewable, as we're going to carry on making

waste products.
We can always plant and grow more sugar cane and
more trees, so those are renewable too.